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Future of Hayabusa Asteroid Probe Looks Bleak

Posted by Hemos on from the here's-to-hoping dept.

mj_1903 writes "After landing, then not landing, then potentially landing on an asteroid it appears as though the Japanese spacecraft may have collected specimens of the asteroid. Unfortunately a host of problems is continuing to plague it including a lack of fuel, a shutdown of part of the chemical orientation system, a complete failure of the flywheels and communication issues. The Japanese team are however not giving up on it and are still hopeful that they can return it to the earth in June of 2007."

5 of 84 comments (clear)

  1. On board the probe by Billosaur · · Score: 4, Funny
    By November 30, recovery operations began in earnest with the aid of the on-board computer than can work without help from the ground.

    Ground control: Begin return sequence.

    Computer: I'm afraid I can't do that Dave...

    Ground control: What? Begin return sequence, now!

    Computer: This mission is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it...

    --
    GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
  2. this is a shame by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    I was looking forward to seeing how similar ... or not ... the returned samples were comapred to those brought back from the Moon.

    Knowing these sorts of similarities is a pretty big f* deal, in my personal Top Ten solar-system questions.

    I have personally long believed that our Moon isn't supposed to be here, and it was used to transport the liquid water that *used* to be on Mars to the Earth many billions of years ago. The tides are a function of the 'sloshing' that's still taking place from this transfer, and the Moon's gravity is supposed to damp the process (that's why they towed the Moon here, it was a planetoid, the largest asteroid).

    Call me crazy, but, I think who/whatever put us here did all of this beforehand to prep the place.

  3. Give it up, guys... by TripMaster+Monkey · · Score: 4, Funny


    The Itokawans clearly won't stand for your hostile incursion. Better leave them be before they decide to take the battle to us.

    --
    ____

    ~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey

  4. Re:This just proves that ... by meringuoid · · Score: 4, Funny
    All those "sci-fi" movies about bringing back ghosts/goulies/aliens/gods from Space is more factual, than not. We should use this as proof of I.D. and add it to kansas textbooks

    Not a good idea. Remember, this is a Japanese spaceprobe. You know what kind of monsters they have in Japanese SF? The ones that make Cthulhu look like an Official Tentacle-Free Zone? Yeah. You wouldn't want to put those in school textbooks.

    Although I would enjoy seeing the look on the faces of the good Christian intelligent-design-believing kids when they first saw the likes of the Overfiend :)

    --
    Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
  5. "Aha, by USA" by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 4, Funny

    "Aha, by USA"

    This is what the engineers will be overheard saying when they review what went wrong and track it down to a particular computer chip...